Be a part of this exciting, rewarding, and innovative program to create the kind of business you want to see in the world!

» Read about the CAFÉ CREATOR Program in the Oakland Tribune.

Voice.

Your purchase includes exclusive invitations to forums and events, where you may contribute your ideas and play an influential roll in shaping the Awaken Café. You are our partners in creating this exciting vision.

Vote.

Your purchase is a vote for a business committed to: building a real sense of community, a downtown area ready for redevelopment, a thriving arts scene, a sustainable business model, and a world-class coffee café and restaurant. Ultimately, it is a vote for individuals, businesses, and communities being all inclusive and in harmony.

The Awaken Café will be a valuable resource for people to meet, network, celebrate, unwind, and be connected. Through this program, our customers will have a stake and a voice in the businesses that serve them. At the Awaken Café, the line between CUSTOMER and COMPANY, between US and YOU dissolves. We are very excited by what is possible when many members of our community come together to cast their vote for business like the Awaken Café.

» How much do you spend on coffee in a year? Go here.

Co-Create the Awaken Café.

Along with other financing sources, this program makes up an important and necessary component of our forecasted financial needs for our phase two expansion. That is to say the proceeds from the sale of the Cards will give us an important addition to our start-up funds needed to open the Awaken Café.

Share the Opportunity.

Another important role to play in this program could be to share (this feature requires you to disable your browsers pop-up window blocker) this opportunity and the Awaken Café vision with your friends, family, and community members. Working together something extraordinary is possible, and we invite you help spread the word.

Become a CAFÉ CREATOR!

We thank you for considering being a CAFÉ CREATOR!

We thank you for your support of the Awaken Café and helping us to reach our goal of raising $125,000 through the sale of CAFÉ CREATOR Cards and open the Awaken Café Phase Two.

» See our progress here and the current CAFÉ CREATORS here.

» What people are saying about the Awaken Café and the CAFÉ CREATOR Card program:

I work right downtown (in the Rotunda building, across from City Hall), so I been interested to see what kind of business was going to move into the old Golden Bull space. Then someone brought some of the "cafe creator" flyers to Monkey Yoga, where I work out. I read a little bit about you and was thrilled to see that such a progressive and arts-oriented business was coming to downtown. I used to be a member of a workers-coop cafe/restaurant at UC Santa Cruz, so your efforts to create a values-driven and community-orientated business, and your unique fund-raising approach, were especially intriguing. Besides... I could hardly pass up an investment that returns food!"

- Logan DeLey, CAFÉ CREATOR.

"I am very excited about the cafe, and the opportunity to bring so much of the vibrant and vital artistic culture I've been able to be a part of in San Francisco to my beloved Oaktown (y'know, w/o losing its working class edge of course)."

- Paul Corman-Roberts, CAFÉ CREATOR.

"I'm looking forward to the opening of the cafe. I work across the street and have been excited to see the recent construction activity. You're working on a cool project that fits with my interests too (organic food, green construction, art and dance, community...)."

- Abe Doherty, CAFÉ CREATOR.

"Next spring I'll be moving to a restored historic structure across from the Fox Theater. I'd like to live in a neighborhood with independently owned shops and restaurants, rather than chain stores. I bought the gift card because I wanted to help an independently owned business open up downtown and because I wanted to contribute to the smart development of my new neighborhood."

"Dunlap and Christensen embrace the notion of 'conscious capitalism,' which places just as much emphasis on the person as the profit. It's about making sure everyone is involved in the process and has a stake in it's success, which is something smart entrepreneurs quickly learn to do."

"When I saw the sign in the window about Awaken Cafe with the inspired mission statement I was intrigued and excited. I checked out the webpage, read about the gift card, loved the concept and felt compelled to help a local business that I believe will improve my own quality of life."

"Turning to patrons to help open a restaurant is a unique approach, said Kevin Westlye, executive director of the Golden Gate Restaurant Association. 'I think this is a great example of someone using a creative process to address a traditional issue,' he said."

“We vote with our dollars and most of us want to make a difference. Community supported business, of which gift cards are a part, is a way to belong and support the emerging new paradigm of ‘being attentive to the whole.’”